SEO

August 1, 2009

How to avoid Gmail's Sponsored Links - About Gmail

How to avoid Gmail's Sponsored Links

Are you a Gmail user, or do you have friends who are? Do you resent the "Sponsored Link" advertisements that come up next to the incoming mail? Now you and your friends can do something about it!

The solution is simple, when sending an email to a gmail user include a sentence or two that mentions catastrophic events or tragedies. Google does not use humans to read your email, only computers. These computers search for keywords that trigger the advertisements, however, if they hapen to find a catastrophic event or tragedy Google errs on the side of good taste and removes the ads altogether.

You may want to make mention of what you are doing so the recipient is not alarmed by your sudden Tourette's-like outburst. You can link to this site by way of explanation if need be.

Before

After

Of course, Google still slips in some non-generative ads too, just for good measure.

UPDATE - Turns out, these are not ads either but "Web Clips" which you can turn off in preferences so the dream of ad free gmail lives!

UPDATE 2 If the message runs long google turns the ads back on, however, if you add another "sensitive" word they go off again. After extensive testing I've discovered you need 1 catastrophic event or tragedy for every 167 words in the rest of the email. I usually toss in a couple extra for good measure.

I've been told by an early adopter that the very elegant and self explanitory "These words are designed to kill advertisements" works wonderfully.


Targeted ads in Gmail

All major free webmail services carry advertising, and most of it is irrelevant to the people who see it. Some services which compete with Gmail attempt to target theirs ads to users based on their de mographic profile (e.g., gender, income level or family status). Google believes that showing relevant advertising offers more value to users than displaying random pop-ups or untargeted banner ads. In Gmail, users will see text ads and links to related pages that are relevant to the content of their messages. The links to related pages are similar to Google search results, and are culled from Google's extensive index of web pages. They are selected solely for their helpfulness and are not paid advertisements.

Ads and links to related pages only appear alongside the message that they are targeted to, and are only shown when the Gmail user, whether sender or recipient, is viewing that particular message. No email content or other personally identifiable information is ever shared with advertisers. In fact, advertisers do not even know how often their ads are shown in Gmail, as this data is aggregated across thousands of sites in the Google Network.

By offering Gmail users relevant ads and information related to the content of their messages, we aim to offer users a better webmail experience. For example, if you and your friends are planning a vacation, you may want to see news items or travel ads about the destination you're considering.

To ensure a quality user experience for all Gmail users, we avoid showing ads reflecting sensitive or inappropriate content by only showing ads that have been classified as "Family-Safe." Gmail's filters also block ads from running next to messages about catastrophic events or tragedies, erring on the side of not displaying an ad if the content is questionable.

Many people have found that the search-related ads on Google.com can be valuable--not merely a necessary evil, but a welcome feature. Similarly, many users have told us that they have found Gmail's ads and related pages to be helpful, because the information reflects their interests.